


After the Bombs Fell

by wildenettles



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Awkward Flirting, Awkward Romance, Developing Relationship, Gay Male Character, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Marriage, Romance, Sole Survivor isn't the parent, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:54:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25557664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildenettles/pseuds/wildenettles
Summary: I wrote about my oc Oliver and how he copes after the loss of his parents and the nuclear fallout. And how he develops a relationship with Birdie, the very strange wanderer.
Relationships: Male Original Character/Birdie, Male Sole Survivor/Birdie
Kudos: 8





	After the Bombs Fell

**Author's Note:**

> I absolutely adore Birdie, if you haven't yet, please go download Tales of the Commonwealth, it's such a good mod.

He was sixteen when the bombs fell. He still remembers his neighbours’ screams, how the military drove in and barked orders for everyone to get to shelter, and the shrill wail of the siren overhead. Sometimes he still hears that siren in his sleep. Sometimes he remembers it better than his parents' voices. 

Almost two hundred years later he watched his brother be wrenched out of their mother’s arms, when the scarred man clicked back the safety of the gun and shot her between the eyes. Her head thumped back against the wall, blood trickled down her face. He can’t remember what she looked like without it. 

Sixty years passed before the pod finally opened and he stumbled out, cold and aching. Everyone was dead. He tried waking up his dad because he was military once and he’d know what to do, only his body was frozen solid, eyes open but empty, staring up at nothing. So he was alone. 

* * *

And that was how he spent his life for the next four years. Surviving the horrors of the commonwealth with only a German shepherd by his side for company. He learned quickly not to trust anyone, not to get too close, because people died easily out here and he’d lost his whole family in what felt like a day, so what fucking point was there in letting anyone in? Raiders sliced open his face and laughed at him, and sometimes he found himself staring at broken fragments from a mirror and trying to remember what he used to look like before the scars. There’s a lot he wishes he could remember, but crying about it doesn’t solve anything. So he presses on even when he feels like he’d rather die, and that’s how he found himself standing on top of a rooftop of some ghoul infested town with a masked man, watching as he aims his sniper rifle and gets one in the head. 

“Good thing I didn’t shoot you too, would’ve been… I don’t know. Awkward?” The man says. 

Oliver snorts. “Probably. I did help you after all.”

“Yeah. That’s what gave you away. That and all the hair. And that winning smile. You should be a shampoo model.” 

Oliver blinks, not knowing what to say to that. A lot of shit has been said about him over the years but never… Well, he can’t say no one has tried to hit on him, but no one has done it in such a nonchalant way. Heat fills his cheeks and he looks below as though checking for more ghouls. Thankfully there’s one and he shoots it before it can crawl up to them. 

“Oh yeah. I’m Birdie.” 

“Birdie?” 

The man looks down his scope and shoots again. Oliver doesn’t see where, but he can hear the garbled groan of a ghoul and the splash of its body hitting the water. His eyebrows lift in amazement. This guy might be a better shot than MacCready. 

“Bertrand,” he says, “But I like Birdie better. Less fancy, less wordy. More time for other things like tying my shoes.”

“Oh,” Oliver chews the inside of his cheek, wondering if he should even bother keeping up this talk because usually, this leads up to someone wanting something from him. Some problem he’s got to solve because for whatever reason no one else can deal with their own shit. But somehow he doesn’t get that vibe from Birdie. “... I’m Oliver. You here alone?” 

“No. You’re here too.” 

Oliver huffs out a laugh, then stops once he realizes it’s been ages since he’s last laughed. His throat feels dry so he takes a swig of his water, stops, then offers some to Birdie. The other man looks at it, though it’s hard to tell with the gas mask where he’s looking exactly and shakes his head. 

“I don’t like sharing drinks, it’s like sharing the same air, or kissing, which is weird, you know, because we just met.” 

Oliver laughs again, then drowns it out with another swig. 

* * *

  
  


They end up travelling together for the next year, though Oliver honestly couldn’t explain how or why. He’s right about Birdie being a better shot than MacCready. The guy is practically a beast, yet he never boasts about it. The most he says is he’s good at sniping but bad at talking. Which is true. But so is Oliver. So there are hours spent between them where Birdie says whatever’s on his mind and Oliver listens. They sit on the hood of an old pickup truck and Birdie tells him they need more soap and coasters, and that he shot a man who hurt a dog. Oliver’s cheeks fill with warmth when Birdie turns to him and says he’s his best friend. His hands itch to touch Birdie, to run his fingers through his hair and kiss him. And then he wonders where the hell that’s coming from because Oliver’s never thought of anyone like that before. There were guys in school he’d been crushing on, sure, but that was an entire lifetime ago, and Oliver’s not the same person anymore. Birdie stares back at him, and he’s not wearing the mask now, so Oliver sees his deep, dark eyes and how earnest they are. Puppy dog eyes are how Nick described them before. Oliver looks away, feeling all too hot and exposed before he notices there’s a dusting of hair on Birdie’s chin. 

“You’re growing some scruff,” he says. 

Birdie’s eyes widen and he touches his chin. “I wasn’t even trying this time!” 

Oliver laughs. He does that a lot more lately. 

* * *

  
  
  


It’s a month later when they’re held up in some old church. Rain hammers down, lighting cracks and splits the sky apart, and the following roll of thunder reminds Oliver of a deathclaw. He leans against the window and stares out into the murky distance, where a swamp has grown over an old school and rain hits the water and erupts into sparks. It’d be almost pretty if there weren’t a lumbering behemoth off in the distance, standing underneath one of the tallest trees as though trying to keep out of the rain. Oliver probably would’ve found it funny if he didn’t know that the mutants were once regular people, and that behemoth was once someone like him. Did he remember anything? Did he have a family who wondered where he was? Does he think about life before he’d been mutated, or does he think he’s always been this way? It's worse than dying, Oliver thinks, to be stuck inside a body that isn’t yours anymore, to forget yourself entirely and become a monster out of the old comic books he used to read as a kid. Birdie found him one, remembered he’d talked about it before and gave it to him. It’s sitting on his lap now, the issue where Grognak is brainwashed and forced to fight his teammates. He’d taken it out to read but he can’t concentrate on the words or even the pictures. It’s all just a messy blur to him. 

“Ollie?” Birdie says. Oliver looks over. Birdie is soaked from head to toe, his jacket clinging to him and droplets of water hitting the floorboards in soft pitter-patter. There’s a small mirelurk dangling from his outstretched hand. “I know they’re gross and slimy but we don’t have enough food so I thought it’d be better than starving?” 

Oliver gets up and takes the mirelurk. It’s cold and slippery and he kinda wants to chuck it out the window instead of eating it, but Birdie’s right. There’s not enough food for both tonight and the journey back to the nearest settlement tomorrow. 

“Yeah. It’s a good idea. I’ll cook, you get yourself dry.” 

Birdie is wearing the mask again but Oliver can feel him beaming behind it. He tries to ignore how that makes his stomach tighten in a way he’d not felt in years. Oliver sets to work on lighting a fire downstairs among the pews and carves off some meat. There’s enough for both of them and Dogmeat, who lays curled up nearby, enjoying the fire's warmth. The second the meat starts cooking though he’s up and seeking shelter upstairs from the smell. Oliver can’t blame him. He’s a dog after all, and while it smells awful to Oliver, it’s ten times worse for poor Dogmeat’s sensitive nose. Birdie is downstairs a short while later, wearing one of Oliver’s shirts and a pair of sweats they’d found at an old clothes store. Oliver can’t help but watch as the shirt rises when Birdie stretches, showing the creamy skin of his stomach and the light dusting of hair that disappears behind the band of his sweats. He wants to put his mouth on him, Oliver realises with a sharp intake of breath, wants to drag teeth and tongue down the smooth expanse of skin and feel him shiver underneath. Suddenly feeling too hot in his jacket, he shoves it off. The food is ready and they eat in silence. It’s not until Oliver has forced himself to swallow the last mouthful of tough mirelurk meat that he realises Birdie is unusually quiet. He’s poking at his own food with a crooked fork. 

“You alright?” Oliver asks. 

Birdie lifts his head to show he’s listening. The mask is still on. “Yeah. Well… No. Not really.” 

Oliver shifts. “Well, if you wanna talk about it, I’m here.” 

“That’s just it. You listen. Most people… I don’t know… Just wait their turn?” 

So Oliver listens as Birdie tells him a story about his past, which isn’t something that usually happens. Birdie doesn’t say much about it. Which Oliver only notices now, that Birdie knows so much about him but what does Oliver really know about Birdie? Well, he knows this much. After he shot the man who hurt a dog, people were scared of him, which confused him because he thought he did something good. And he left his hometown because he didn’t want to keep scaring everyone. 

“Are you scared of me?” Birdie asks once his story is over. 

Oliver shakes his head. “You’ve seen me do fucked up shit. You scared of me?” 

“Sometimes. But not of you. Sometimes I’m scared you’re gonna do something.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“You know,” Birdie gestures at him, “Hurt yourself.” 

Oliver glances down. His arms show scars, worn, silvery ones that trail down from his forearms to his wrists. Some are from before the war. Most are afterwards. When he felt too weak, too scared, too full of something raw and ugly that churned inside him and he didn’t want to think about it anymore. He needed a release. But he’d not done it since Birdie caught him a few weeks after they began travelling together. He’d held his bloodied wrist in his hand and without a word got to work on cleaning it up and bandaging it. Only when Oliver was fixed up did he speak, and it was to say he’d die quicker from infection than blood loss. 

“But I’ve not done it in ages,” Oliver holds his wrists out for Birdie. 

“And I’m proud of you,” Birdie holds his wrists, and it’s not like that night, there’s no blood slicking his hands and making them sticky, no thick stink of metal, no tears from Oliver or shame and shock suffocating them both. It’s just them, with the crackle of the fire near them, their bodies seemingly glowing from the fire’s light and a plate of uneaten mirelurk shoved to the side. 

“You’re my best friend, Ollie,” Birdie says, soft and sweet and Oliver feels a hot prick behind his eyes and tries not to cry. 

“You’re mine too,” he manages to say, voice cracking when he speaks again, “But I’m also… I like you. I like you a lot. As more than my friend.” 

He expects Birdie to drop his hands like they’re radiated to hell. To walk away in disgust and leave him sitting alone next to the campfire. But Birdie never does anything expected, and he should know that now. He sits back and tilts his head. 

“So like friends with touching? That’s what you want? Well… If it’s you, I guess it’s okay.” 

* * *

  
  


A few months go by and very little changes between them even though they’re dating now. But it’s like before, just with more touching, as Birdie had described it. Oliver finds that Birdie very much enjoys touching, despite his stance on diseases and germs. He wraps his arms around Oliver’s waist and lays his chin on his shoulder to look at what Oliver does on his pip-boy. He holds his hand during long walks through Boston. When they’re safe in Red Rocket and taking a break he wants to share a bed, to hold Oliver in his sleep, and they wake up with their legs intertwined. 

The most surprising change, however, is that Birdie is apparently the jealous type. 

They’re in a bar in Goodneighbor. There’s a local thug leering down at Oliver and the man almost gags on the thick sting of alcohol and rotten teeth on his breath. 

“You’re too pretty for a place like this,” he says and Oliver rolls his eyes at the line, “You should come back to my place. I can treat you real good.”

“I’m not interested,” Oliver says, and steps away from the bar. A greasy hand clasps his arm and yanks him back. 

“Now don’t get like that. I’m gonna buy you a drink. What will you have?” 

“Nothing. Now take your fucking hand off me before I break it off,” Oliver growls. He may be small, but he’s the perfect height to knee this prick in the dick and steal his caps before he can get up again. 

The guy laughs at him and clenches his fingers hard enough that Oliver grits his teeth. “I’m being real nice here. So don’t take that tone with me or there’ll be trouble,” he says. 

Oliver opens his mouth to retort but a fist punches the fucker in the jaw, knocking him back and forcing him to drop Oliver’s arm. It’s Birdie, standing by Oliver with his chest heaving as though he’s run a marathon, hands shaking by his sides. Blood drips down his knuckles where he’d hit the guy. 

“Don’t touch my boyfriend!” He snarls and it’s the angriest Oliver’s ever heard him. Even when they argue he’s never used this voice on him. Before he can think about it further Birdie takes his hand and leads him away. Everyone at the bar stares at them, someone wolf whistles and there’s a few chuckles before Birdie and Oliver disappear behind the door upstairs. 

Outside the night sky is black and there’s a slight chill even though it’s meant to be closer to summer now. Birdie doesn’t stop until they’re outside the apartment Hancock gave Oliver after they stopped Bobbi from stealing from him. 

“I never asked if you were okay,” he says, “Are you okay?” 

He’s still shaking with rage, Oliver notices. He can’t see his boyfriend’s face with the mask on but he sees how flushed his skin is and how his Adam’s apple bobs when he swallows thickly. 

“Yeah I’m fine,” Oliver says, taking Birdie’s bloodied fist, “That was pretty cool though. You took him out with a single punch.” 

“I didn’t realise he was hurting you at first. I thought he was touching you like how I do it. And only I’m supposed to be doing that now. Because I’m your boyfriend. And you’re mine. And I was gonna say that, you know, not hit the guy in the face until I saw how hard he was grabbing you and heard what he said.” 

“You probably saved his life. I would’ve done worse,” Oliver gives a half-smile. 

“Oh. I’m sorry.” 

“No. Birdo, that was a joke. You did great. I’m impressed. Didn’t think you had a possessive streak.” 

“But I don’t,” Birdie says with a tilt of his head. 

He heads inside and Birdie closes the door behind them. Dogmeat is asleep in his basket by the bedroom door. They don’t have much in the way of furniture, just a rickety old table, some chairs and a beaten-down double bed. But it’s better than nothing, and they’re not here too often anyway. Red Rocket is their home. Oliver sets his pack on the table. He’d gotten them some food and drink for the night, and even some canned dog food for Dogmeat, which he pours out into a small bowl and sets beside the dog’s bed. Birdie hasn’t moved. Sensing he wants to say something, Oliver stands up and looks to his boyfriend. 

“You okay?” 

“I don’t want to possess you,” Birdie blurts out, fiddling with his fingers, “Because you’re a person, and you can’t really own a person since that makes them a slave and slavery is bad. But… I don’t like the idea of anyone else touching you like I do.” 

“Birdie…” 

“And that’s not because of disease or anything, though it might be. Because I don’t want you getting sick either. But mostly it’s because I love you.” 

Oliver blinks in astonishment. His mouth pops open and closed but he doesn’t know what to say. They’ve not mentioned the “L” word yet, though Oliver has often caught himself before he’s said it because he didn’t want to rush things or make Birdie uncomfortable. 

“You love me?” He finally gets out. 

Birdie shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “Yeah? I mean… I think I do. I’m not sure what it is but I’m pretty sure we’re something better than it, you know? Like you’re the best person in my life.” 

“You’re mine too,” Oliver says without hesitation, “God, Birdie, I love you too.” 

He crosses the room and throws his arms around Birdie’s shoulders, burying his face in his neck. Birdie quickly wraps his arms around him too, squeezing him close. He smells like gunpowder and rubber but Oliver doesn’t mind since it’s so distinctly  _ Birdie _ and just makes him think of home. Not the one that was destroyed years ago, but the one he has now. With his boyfriend and his dog, and when they find Shaun, their family will be complete.

* * *

  
  


Shaun, as it turns out, is not an infant or a ten-year-old boy, but a sixty-year-old man brainwashed by his kidnappers and now leading the Institute. It’d almost be funny in a tragic sort of way if Oliver wasn’t so fucking enraged by it. 

He’d spent  _ years _ searching for Shaun, for any sign, any lead, any way of getting his baby brother back. Only to find that in the end, his baby brother was the one to set him free from the Vault just to see what he’d do like it was all some kind of science experiment, a sick game. Oliver punches the fucker in the jaw. The blood is a stark contrast to his crisp, clean suit and perfect teeth. Oliver stands over him and tells him he is nothing to him. The synth Shaun doesn’t even react. Can’t react because the real Shaun shut him off. It all feels so unreal, like a bad dream, but Oliver fees the adrenaline pumping through his veins and the rage curling hot and heavy in his gut and he knows he’s awake. He doesn’t sleep that night, and instead of keeping Birdie awake with his tossing and turning, he decides to smoke outside, shivering in his parka and watching the trees bend and shake with the wind. He used to like this as a kid, listening to the wind howling, the tree branches tapping at the windows, the raindrops pattering the roof. It all helped send him off to sleep. But now, it’s almost like it’s taunting him. Memories of his past life that dig their icy fingers into his body and leave him feeling torn and vulnerable. He’s not supposed to be here, he thinks, he should’ve died with his parents. He’s got no business being here, in a world so detached from the one he knew. 

Birdie finds him with the gun in his hand an hour later. Oliver still can’t remember if he actually intended to do anything. He doesn’t even remember when he picked it up. But he does remember Birdie’s warm hand on his as he took the gun away, before wrapping his arms around Oliver and burying his face into the crook of his neck. He doesn’t say anything, which is a first for them. And Oliver can’t stop talking. Another first. He lets out every single thought that’s rattling in his head, weighing him down, he tells Birdie he should’ve died, that he’s angry with himself and with Shaun and with everything that’s happened. He feels like a failure, an outcast, a disappointment. He’s let his family down. 

“You haven’t let me down,” Birdie says. 

It’s such a simple sentence but it’s the crack Oliver needed to tear his walls down. He’s sobbing uncontrollably into Birdie’s shoulder, body shaking with the effort of it. He doesn’t stop until his eyes are puffy and swollen and his chest feels lighter like he’s actually found a release that didn’t come with hurting himself. Birdie runs his fingers through Oliver’s hair and presses their foreheads together. 

* * *

  
  


Oliver is twenty-two when he says, “I do,” to Birdie. Technically he’s actually over two hundred, but that’s too many numbers to think about. When they kiss Birdie’s cupping Oliver’s face and their lips move together with the same practised ease, but it feels so much  _ more _ . They’re  _ married _ now. Also, there’s a priest watching them and that’s kind of weird so it doesn’t last too long. But when they pull away they’re both smiling and Oliver isn’t a Morrison anymore he’s a Watanabe. Birdie takes their marriage certificate and folds it up carefully. 

“Now there are more white people than Asian in our family,” he says. 

Oliver snorts but he can’t help the jolt of warmth that hits him when Birdie calls it “ _ Our family _ .” 

He ends up on his back in Homeplate, legs spread wide and the bed squeaking underneath them as Birdie ruts into him. He’s got his fingers in Birdie’s hair, tugging when his cock hits that spot that makes his toes curl. Birdie grabs his hips, dragging him onto his lap, and snaps into him harder and Oliver can’t help the wanton noises that slip out, grabbing at the pillows and arching off the bed when he cums, untouched. Birdie isn’t far behind, rutting into him at a sloppy pace until he stills and cums, filling Oliver with his warmth. 

After a few minutes, Birdie pulls out, and they lay panting on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Oliver feels sticky and sweaty and there’s cum leaking from his hole but he doesn’t want to move to wash. He kind of wants a cigarette now, but Birdie asked him to give them up so he’s trying for him. He reaches for Birdie’s hand and squeezes. 

“Sorry,” Birdie says, “I don’t know what came over me.” His chest and face are still flushed pink and he’s got bite marks and scratches where Oliver got too rough with him. Though in fairness, Oliver has his own matching marks.

“Don’t be,” he replies, stretching and groaning as a bone clicks, “I loved every second of that.” 

“Yeah, but this whole making love thing is a lot harder than our neighbours make it out to be,” Birdie lifts their joined hands and kisses Oliver’s knuckles. “But I think I’m getting better at it. Or you’re just better at faking it. Kudos to your acting coach if you are.” 

Oliver chuckles. “No. That was all you. We’ve both gotten better at it.” 

Their first few attempts at sex had been awkward, but still good. It was a lot more grinding with clothes on, sloppy make outs and either stroking each other off or blow jobs. Birdie didn’t want to try penetrative sex until they’d found lube and condoms. Whenever Birdie bottoms he insists on Oliver wearing one because he hates the feeling of cum inside him, whereas Oliver loves it. It’s one of his kinks that Birdie doesn’t understand but he still indulges for him. 

“Can we do it again?” 

Oliver splutters. “I don’t know.  _ Can  _ we?” 

Birdie kisses him, slow and lazy. Turns out they can go again, after a lot of heavy touching and Birdie sucking Oliver off. He ends up on Birdie’s lap, bouncing on his cock and moaning with each stroke of his prostate. Birdie arches his hips and helps rock against him, pushing his cock in deeper. 

“You’re so pretty. You’re like sunshine. So, so pretty,” Birdie gasps out when he’s close. Oliver whines, head dipped low like he’s trying to hide, but Birdie sits up and drags him into another biting kiss. “Ollie. Look at me. You’re so… Well… Sexy? Is that a word? Feels kinda, you know, dirty?” 

As though realising what they’re doing Birdie huffs out a laugh and kisses Oliver’s cheek. 

“But I guess that’s okay now.” 

“Yeah,” Oliver holds Birdie’s head in his hands, “It’s very okay now.” 

* * *

  
  


The next morning Oliver is sore but happy. He’s sitting next to his husband at their table and Shaun, the synth Shaun, is back from a sleepover at a friends house. Oliver couldn’t leave him behind, even if he was a machine, he was still a kid. One who looked up to Oliver and knew him as his big brother. He couldn’t remember anything else. Oliver had to be the one to explain their parents died years ago and Oliver’s been looking after him ever since. The synth Shaun has artificial memories of their childhood, he doesn’t know about the vault, or that Oliver is from the pre-war era, or that Kellog killed their mother. He thinks raiders did, that they used to own a farm. He doesn’t even remember the Institute anymore. Oliver’s not sure if he’s gonna keep it that way, because really the kid deserves to know the truth, even if it’s gonna change everything. Or maybe he should just keep his mouth shut if this new life makes Shaun happier. 

He shouldn’t be thinking about this now. He ruffles Shaun’s hair, and Shaun swats his hand away. He tells them through a mouthful of mac-n-cheese that he got to see Valentine in action when he caught a thief red-handed, that he got to listen to some of his stories from his detective days. 

“I want to be a detective too when I grow up,” he says. 

“Oh, good, you can find my missing sock then,” Birdie says. 

“What do you mean? I just got you a new pair,” Oliver narrows his eyes at Birdie. 

“Oh yeah. Meant to tell you. Lost it.” 

“Well you better find it, I’m not getting you another pair if you’re only gonna toss it into another dimension again.”

“I don’t toss it anywhere except the floor. So I guess that’s where the other dimension is. We should go back to Red Rocket, the floors there weren’t nearly so treacherous.” 

“You guys are weird,” Shaun says, putting down his fork, “I’m done. Can I go to Nat’s house?” 

“Sure. Bring your jacket, it's cold,” Oliver says. Shaun grabs the ratty old jacket Birdie patched up for him, after pricking himself a grand total of twenty-seven times with the needle, and is out the door before Oliver can even say goodbye. For some reason that makes something lodge in Oliver’s throat and he’s trying to blink back the sudden hot prick behind his eyes. 

Birdie takes his hand and squeezes. “Hey,” he says, and that’s all he needs to say before Oliver is blubbering between sobs about how he never said goodbye to Shaun, the real Shaun, the one he watched get ripped out of their mother’s arms and the one he punched in the face before leaving. Shaun died a few days later, he was sick, apparently, but Oliver doesn’t know if his illness killed him before the explosion did and that makes Oliver want to throw up. 

“You couldn’t do anything. The Institute did all that. They took him in the first place. And then he let you out. So really, what could you have done?” Birdie says. 

“I could have at least said goodbye. He was my baby brother, after all,” Oliver rubs at his eyes. 

“He was a very old baby.” 

“You know what I mean.” 

Birdie sits back but he’s still holding Oliver’s hand. He gives it a squeeze. “Alright, so let’s go say goodbye.” 

* * *

  
  


They end up leaving wildflowers where the Institute used to be. Oliver doesn’t know if he forgives his brother, and maybe he never will, but he doesn’t want to pretend he never existed either. When he lays down the flowers, he also thinks of their parents. Maybe they would have dealt with this whole situation better. Maybe they would have had the answers he’s been lacking. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, but he doesn’t know to who. “Goodbye.” 

Birdie holds his hand again. “You’ll see them again sometime. Heaven is supposed to be nice. Lots of white people though.” 

Oliver snorts and nudges Birdie with his arm. Birdie just pulls him in for a hug and kisses his forehead. Shaun gags in the background and Oliver flips him off without thinking. Then they’re all laughing and heading back to Diamond City, and Oliver doesn’t feel so heavy anymore. He doesn’t know if he’s truly fixed, or if he’s just going to spiral again, but with Birdie’s hand in his, he feels safe. 

**Author's Note:**

> I plan to write more of this pairing :) I know I say that a lot haha


End file.
